How to find a destination to take photos near you?
Most of us travel to scenic places only after seeing the destination on Instagram, Snapchat, or Facebook. Finding the right location to travel to is indeed an essential part of taking great photos and videos.
Maybe to hone up your photography skills or to take damn great pictures for your social media followers; there are a great many reasons to find scenic destinations.
Rick Perdian, the best music travel consultant, has compiled a list of best apps and websites to find great photo locations in and outside your area and ten of the best scenic destinations around the world.
There is a wide variety of apps and websites designed to help you find great photography locations.
ShotHotspot
ShotHotspot is a search engine for photographers. You can log into the website or the respective apps on your smartphone and search for the hotspots.
Add your location or hotspot in the search bar, and you’ll get a map of popular photo spots in the area. The search engine also loads up the map with the exact location and ratings for all the hotspots with photo examples.
It uses location data from images on sites like Flickr to automatically update the most popular photo destinations. You can also identify new hotspots or add information and comments to existing ones, hence populating the popular destinations in the search engine.
ShotHotSpot also narrows down the location search by architecture, abandoned, streets, lights, city, wildlife, sunset/sunrise, astrophotography, water/coastal, weddings, abandoned places, landscaped, etc.
It would be best if you were careful when uploading your photo and choosing the hotspot type, theme, and keywords because it could end up in the wrong location.
This website is the perfect location to start for travel enthusiasts and photographers to find great places to take photos.
It’s also completely free to use. And, the app is available for both iOS and Android users.
PIXEO
PIXEO is the crowd-sourced collection of the best photo spot around the world. It currently features more than 10,000 locations provided by more than 200 paid subscribers.
The locations are based on photos submitted by individual users, and each location gets reviewed by PIXEO staff. Beyond location, you can also visit locations pinned on the map. You’ll get all the information about the location along with the current weather.
It’s exclusively made for iPhone users; hence Android users may find it inaccessible. Unlike ShotHotSpot, you’d need to pay for using this app. Upon downloading the app on your phone, you’ll need to subscribe monthly or annually for $3 and $25, respectively. Don’t worry; you’ll get a 30-day trial to test the app before you start paying.
Google Maps
Google Maps is probably the most popular platform to search for locations, geography, terrain, landmarks, city, park, lakes, mountain, and hiking trail. Almost everyone you know would rely on the Google Map app to search for any location.
The best about it is that it allows you to search for a location and find photographic attractions using the photos submitted by the individual users. Another great thing is that it’s completely free. You can use it on a desktop or download the iOS/Android app on your smartphone.
Don’t confuse Google Maps with Google Earth. Google Earth allows you to get a 3D panoramic view and bird’s-eye view of the pinpointed places to learn more about geography, locations, terrain, etc.
Why Instagram, because Instagram has nearly 1 billion monthly active users worldwide. One billion is a significant number when you consider all the photos submitted on the app daily.
The app is home to billions of photos of places, top-rated tourist attractions, landmarks, and restaurants that are sometimes hard to find on Google Maps. You can use the search option to search for location based on the keyword; place name, landmarks, trendy topics, users, etc., which makes it easy to find photographic locations.
Since Instagram is very popular and users tend to upload their photos soon after they take them, sometimes you can get a glimpse of what is happening at the moment.
Rest assured, it’s completely free, and you can use it on a desktop or smartphone.
500px
500px is unlike any other app. Here, you upload your photos to sell to others. However, you can also use this app as a search engine to find popular attractions according to the photos posted.
500px is a great tool to help you find beautiful photo locations and also figure out what types of photoshoots are possible at the location. However, you must be a registered user to access and buy the photos. If you don’t want to buy or sell, that’s Ok; you can use it to find location photo opportunities.
The site has over 15 million users; hence you are sure to find photos of a lot of different locations.
Photographer’s Website
Photographer’s website is the last place you’ll go to find photos of different locations. Although many photographers keep their portfolios on their websites, they won’t publish all of the pictures. However, you can still use this as a resource to find photos of photographic places.
You can rely on the photographer’s website and social media pages, travel blogs, local tourism pages, and TripAdvisor to find your preferred destinations.
You’re advised to follow or add photographers on social media such as Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram to access their photography websites with ease.
10 Best Photographic Locations around the world
According to Forbes.com, here are the ten best locations around the world for travel photography.
1. Norway
2. Dubai
3. Hawaii
4. Vermont
5. Great Barrier Reef
6. Croatia
7. Southeast China
8. Borneo
9. Southern Brazil
10. Iceland
In the time of lockdown and COVID-19 pandemic worldwide, you’re advised to search for your preferred destinations and keep them for another year. You can always visit your preferred location when the pandemic dies down.
Check out this infographic for more information
Get in touch with www.RickPerdian.com to find out more about fabulous places worldwide for travel and music.
